page_title: University of Tartu
section_title: Universität Dorpat
hierarchical_section_title: University of Tartu / History / Universität Dorpat
caption_attribution_description: Eesti: Tartu
context_page_description: The University of Tartu is a university in the city of Tartu in Estonia. It is the national university of Estonia, and the only classical university in the country, and also the biggest and most prestigious university in Estonia. It was founded under the name of Academia Gustaviana in 1632 by Baron Johan Skytte, the Governor- General of Swedish Livonia, Ingria and Karelia, with the required ratification provided by his long-time friend and former student – from age 7 –, King Gustavus Adolphus, shortly before the king's death on 6 November in the Battle of Lützen, during the Thirty Years' War.
  Nearly 14,000 students are at the university, of whom over 1,300 are foreign students. The language of instruction in most curricula is Estonian, some more notable exceptions are taught in English, such as semiotics, applied measurement science, computer science, information technology law, and European Union – Russia studies.
  The historical buildings of the university are included in the European Heritage Label list as "embodiment of the ideas of a university in the Age of Enlightenment". The university is a member of the Coimbra Group and the Utrecht Network.
context_section_description: The university was reopened by the Baltic Germans in Estonia in April 1802. The language of instruction at Dorpat was German from 1802 to 1893. During that time, Dorpat had a dual nature in that it belonged both to the set of German(-language) and Russian universities. Financially and administratively, the latter was more important; intellectually and regarding the professoriate and students, the former was more important (over half the professors came from Germany, at least another third were Baltic Germans). Among the 30 German-language universities, of which 23 were inside the German Empire, Dorpat was the 11th in size. In teaching, the university educated the local Baltic German leadership and professional classes, as well as staff, especially for the administration and health system of the entire Russian Empire. In scholarship, it was an international university; the time between 1860 and 1880 was its "golden age".
  The freedom to be a half-German university ceased with the rise of nationalist tendencies in Russia, which held homogenization more important than retaining a bilingual university. Between 1882 and 1898, russification in language, appointments, etc., was imposed, with some exceptions (such as the Divinity School, which the state feared would be used by the Orthodox clergy to teach dangerous Protestant views and was thus allowed to continue in German until 1916). By 1898, when both the town and the university were renamed Yuryev, virtually all distinguished scholars from Germany had left. The University of Yuryev existed until 1918, when during part of the fall term, it was reopened, under German occupation, as Dorpat. Russian academic staff and students took refuge in Voronezh in Russia, giving rise to the foundation of Voronezh State University, which traces its own history back to the foundation of the University of Tartu and still holds several physical properties of the latter.
caption: Main building of the University of Tartu constructed between 1804 and 1809.
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